


Little Inconveniences

by Grimmy88



Category: Left 4 Dead 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-26
Updated: 2013-11-26
Packaged: 2018-01-02 17:06:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1059377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grimmy88/pseuds/Grimmy88
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story set years back when Nick was in his twenties visiting Savannah. His car takes a turn for the worse prompting him to go to a garage that oddly enough has some little kid working it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Little Inconveniences

            There’s a boy behind the desk.

            The bell to the door has already caught his attention and he’s looking up at Nick from under his blue hat questioningly and then expectantly and then eagerly. His mouth is stretched into a lips-only smile, pulling his face and bubbling his cheeks. He’s looking far too happy to see some guy walk into some auto shop.

            Nick frowns and approaches him because the tow-truck driver has already left and because the kid is the only one in the room.

            “Hi!”

            “Hi.” Nick leans against the chest high counter and notes that although the seat the kid’s occupying is a stool he’s still perched on his knees atop it. “Is a mechanic around?”

            The brat doesn’t answer; he’s busy peering over the counter at the gambler’s suit. Nick snaps three times in upward, rapid succession to raise the wandering attention back to his face. For his part the child looks three fourths shocked leaving the remainder chagrined.

            “A mechanic?” He prods.

            “Sorry,” the imp replies. “I juss never saw anybody dressed so nice in here.” Stupid accent, too.

            “Okay, for the third time: a mechanic?”

            The boy flushes. “My grandpa’s back workin’ on another car but I don’t think he’s gonna take too much longer.”

            Nick sighs, because of course this bullshit happens to him. The only thing that had gone right was that he’d gotten into Savannah before Sal’s classically crappy Thunderbird flaked out on him. It had been the whole reason Franco, his ‘boss’, had even called the fatass. Sure, the two older men were friends and even closer colleagues but Sal had been contacted because he was known for his extensive, beloved car collection. Basically, they were some of the best and damn near Savannah.

            And Franco had wanted Nick, his protégé, to have the best.

            Sal’s pissed when said protégé calls him up. His voice only gets loud when he’s told something disheartening about his cars. He blames Nick even though he had done nothing but drive the damn thing at a conservatively safe pace which had been fucking hard considering.

            “Sal, calm the fuck down,” he says once there’s a gap in the successive cussing spewing out the line. He looks over and notes that the kid is watching him with rounded eyes so he turns his back and speaks soft and as polite as he can muster: “If anybody screwed her up it was Johnny. Guy’s a dick.”

            Alright, next sentence he was really going to try and keep it clean for the kid’s sake. For all Nick knew he was as dumb as his accent and dumb kids are like parrots.

            “Okay, relax. I’m gonna pay for everything. I’ll call when I know more.” Sal yells once more and Nick cuts off the call and at least congratulates himself on the sentence cleansing.

            He pockets the phone and turns, immediately startled into stepping back because the kid’s somehow standing right behind him.

            “Didjya take yer dad’s car?”

            “What? No,” Nick says, offended. “I’m too old for that shit.”

            “Well, how old are ya?”

            He doesn’t answer the stupid ass question mainly because he can feel the way his incredulity has contorted his face and he really wants the kid to have some goddamn sense and pick up on it.

            “I’m twelve,” the brat announces instead. And he doesn’t know why he expected anything more.

            “Congratulations. Enjoy puberty.”

            There are some seats, plastic with steel, thin legs; the kind that made up cheap schools and scrape across the floor when you sit in them. His chair does not disappoint. The one next to him shrieks as well. The little punk isn’t even trying to hide the fact that he’s staring when Nick turns to him.

            “What?”

            “I was juss wonderin’ whatchyer down here for since yer dressed all nice.”

            “I’m not dressed nice. I’m not even wearing a tie.” The suit had been relatively cheap, after all.

            “I don’t have any suits.”

            “Not even for communion, huh?”

            “For what?”

            “Nothing,” Nick mutters, feeling at the pack of cigarettes in his pocket and wondering if he had enough time to go smoke one or two or the whole pack.

            Silence takes over the lobby and the gambler’s glad for it. He considers closing his eyes when a finger starts probing into his arm.

            “What?” He wonders if he snarls it because the kid shrinks away, grinning through his discomfort. Nick figures he really needs to learn to control the tone of his voice for more than just the people inside casinos.

            “I juss wanted’ta know yer name.” The boy stands and holds his hand to Nick who finds himself shaking it before he realizes. “I’m Ellis.”

            “Nick.”

            Ellis frowns and keeps a hold of his hand. “Yer supposed’ta stand up when ya shake hands.”

            “Says who?”

            “My grandpa. He says it’s polite.”

            “It is,” Nick affirms. He withdraws from the smaller hand and wonders if the little shit has washed it yet that day.

            Ellis sits beside him again. “So… what kinda car is it?”

            “Sixty-two Thunderbird.”

            His new ‘friend’ gapes at him so long the northerner thinks his eyes will fall out of his skull. Which would be a shame seeing as they’re a shade of blue that would be the only thing to compensate for his annoying personality with the girls.

            “You have’a Thunderbird! Ya gotta be rich!”

            “Let’s just say my friends are.”

            “Wow! Can I ride in it?!”

            “If it could run would I be in this shi—no.”

            The little annoyance deflates and actually pouts for a moment. This is how Nick notices his bottom lip is too big for a boy and he almost feels bad because there’s a very red cut down the absolute middle of it. Maybe his peers weren’t too fond of it yammering away, either.

            “My grandpa’kin fix her. He’kin fix anything.”

            “Swell. How about you go see if he’s done yet?”

            Ellis smiles and, miraculously, does as he’s told.

            He comes back with an old man who isn’t as old as Nick had expected a grandfather to be. His hair, gray at the temples, is mostly tucked under a hat identical to the one on his grandson’s head. His eyes are a different blue, though, and the only feature the two seem to share are the clefts in their chins.

            The old guy holds out a hand smudged with black and brown so Nick stares at it until it’s withdrawn.

            “Sorry, was workin’ on some breaks. What’kin I do fer ya?”

            Ellis, helpfully shouts: “His sixty-two Thunderbird won’t run! He’s gotta sixty-two Thunderbird!”

            “Ellis,” his grandfather, stitched-on name George, chides, “go on an’ fill out those papers.”

            The kid pouts again but returns to his post.

            “Won’t run, huh?” George asks. He’s wiping his hands, stereotypically, on a rag he’d produced from his back pocket. “Anythin’ else?”

            “You’ll have to tell me,” Nick responds. The most he was ever taught was how to change oil and he still hadn’t done that himself.

            The mechanic tells him he’ll have a look and leaves him alone with his grandson once again. Ellis, however, is so focused on the papers in front of him (evidenced by the frown between his eyebrows and the way his tongue keeps poking out absently) that they spend the time waiting in silence.

            It doesn’t take George too long so Nick guesses there must have been some truth to his grandson’s proud claims.

            “It’s yer transmission,” the older man says. The younger man has a feeling he knows what that means but he doesn’t interrupt. “Whoever ya borrowed from has all the original parts.”

            “And I guess that’s gonna cost me?” He decides not to comment on how well he’d been read.

            “Time an’ money; I need’ta order out fer the parts.”

            Nick gets handed forms and a pen and he writes and signs and repeats. He gives them a number to call and one of the last names of which he has an ID to match then leaves the rest to them because he’s tired of smelling the place.

            Of course without the car it’s a little harder to move into the downtown areas, you know, considering he doesn’t know where the fuck he’s going. He’s about to follow a short-skirted woman into a store for directions and more when he hears his name on the air.

            It’s impulse to look. It was the same throughout all his life save for high school when the number of Nick’s escalated. He’d learned to turn and respond only when the voice was that of his principal. Unfortunately it’s a habit he’s lost, having been away from school for far longer than the four years as was normal for his age.

            Apparently nobody else walking the semi-busy streets shares his name because not even one head follows Ellis as he calls it repeatedly and weaves through the zig-zag maze of the walkers.

            The kid reaches his side and takes a breath but doesn’t pant.

            “Did I forget something?” Nick asks.

            “My grandpa says ya probably dunno where’a hotel is. I’kin take ya’ta a really good one nearby.”

            “Your grandfather told you to take a stranger to a hotel?” He monotones it because he really can’t fucking believe this situation.

            “Naw,” Ellis says. “He doesn’t know I left but he finished up his work an’ he’kin juss tell Pete’ta watch the counter ‘cause I only gotta help out when I’m bored or they gotta lotta work’ta do ‘cause then I’kin go through copyin’ stuff an’ writin’ stuff down even though it’s really borin’ but grandpa says--…”

            “Ellis, does now really seem like the best time for this?”

            The kid blinks as if rescued from a daze. “Oh, okay.”

            Nick starts walking again. The brat falls in step next to him, stretching out his legs to match the stride of the longer ones beside him. Annoyed, the northerner turns to go down a street sandwiched by more stores.

            Ellis’ hand falls on his forearm and his fingers curl tight. “It ain’t that way.”

            Honestly, Nick’s taken aback. The majority of children he’d ever met had always been confined to wide-eyed silence around him. It’d been what he’d preferred, of course, and how kids should’ve acted around strangers.

            This brat’s begging to be kidnapped, apparently, and the twenty-two year old’s convinced the only reason it hasn’t happened yet is because he’s fuck-all annoying.

            “C’mon.”

            When Nick doesn’t move (he’s fairly certain he’s going to be arrested if he does follow) the prepubescent shit actually pulls.

            “My grandpa told me this one’s really nice ‘cause it has really big beds an’ TV’s an’ a big pool! I wish my house had’a pool.”

            Ellis keeps yapping all the way to the hotel and Nick burns through three quick cigarettes to keep from strangling the damn stories out of him.

           

            He’s given a reprieve when Ellis leaves him to check into the hotel. Once in his room he seriously considers crashing into bed to battle away his headache. Instead, he hangs up his clothes and readies the bathroom for a prolonged stay.

            Afterward he finds himself moving from bar to bar to casino to bar, spending, spending, gaining it all back and more, to spending just enough for only one more drink. He can stand without wavering and if asked by a police officer to perform that all-too-well known test he’d probably be fine, but he decides it’s enough and that he’s going to have to make big to cover both the car and his goal.

            He gets back to his room and the first number on the clock reads four so he doesn’t concern himself with reading the rest. What he does concern himself with is taking a shower because, yeah, he likes pressing up against cute girls but he isn’t fond of sleeping in their smell if they’re not with him.

            He ends up falling into bed when the first number of the clock reads five and it doesn’t matter because he has the whole day to sleep and the next night to piss away.

            Except it ultimately does matter because Ellis, the little pisser, calls him less than three hours later and won’t shut up until, somehow, Nick finds himself meeting him outside the front of the hotel, cursing the heat, the sun, and those damn papers to which he’d given his number.

 

            Ellis is sitting on a rock that had been aesthetically placed outside the front of the hotel. He grins, all white, straight teeth. Nick finds that strange in a kid his age: yellow-less and metal-less. Hell, when he was twelve he’ had a mouth of braces by his stepmother’s insistence.

            Insistence which had been her leaning down into his face, putting her hands on his cheeks, pulling them from where they normally belonged, and claiming they were going to the orthodontist. _Not that you’re not handsome, Nick, but I’m not dealing with tooth problems later when I can solve them now._

            Nick hadn’t warmed up to her at that point because she technically wouldn’t be his stepmother for another few months but he didn’t remember arguing. It might’ve been because his father had only ever made him get his physicals and checkups when the school had demanded it. Linda had done it when nobody asked.

            Nick figures, with Ellis’ trusting, diabetes-inducing nature, he’d probably gotten attention like that during the years it mattered most.

            “Mornin’!” The little hick slides off the rock, brushes his pant legs, and bounds over.

            “So it is.”

            Ellis laughs a second later. “My grandpa put the order in, express shippin’ an’ everythin’!”

            “He could’ve called and said that any time after one.”

            “…I guess. Y’wanna go see more’a Savannah?”

            “Question,” Nick says, skin and nerves itching for a cigarette that his brain shoots down by way of it being too early or something. “What kind of kid gets up before noon in the summer?”

            “My grandpa says sleepin’ the day away is juss’ta waste’a the summer.”

            “You know what else is a waste of summer? Hanging around strangers and not your friends.”

            Ellis reaches out and they’re walking down the street that easily. “Well, my buddy Keith’s atta camp on’a count’a he broke both his arm an’ his leg last summer an’ his ma thinks he’ll be safer there. I don’t think so though ‘cause all the stuff they do at camps—like canoein’ an’ archery an’ campfires—we done all that already an’ he get hurts pretty much every time. Last time we canoed he managed’ta get his caught on some tree stuck under the water; I dunno how, the whole river was free, y’know? So I couldn’t get him offa it with my oar an’ he couldn’t wiggle free so he ended up fallin’ out an’ tryin’ta pull but even then—…”

            Nick clamps his hands over the kid’s mouth and, yes, he’s hoping he gave the kid whiplash or he at least suffocates. For Ellis’ part, he doesn’t seem surprised, which in turn doesn’t surprise the older man.

            What does surprise him is the southerner’s tongue against his palm.

            Reeling away as if he’d been stung, the gambler can’t help that his first reaction is to laugh. It was clever, after all. His second reaction is a slap upside the shit’s head, and the third, a jump in his gut, he disregards.

            His wipes his hand on Ellis’ shoulder. “So you’re telling me Keith is your only friend?”

            “No,” the response is a little too defensive. “My other friend Dave juss’ moved here, but he’s at his grandma’s fer the rest’a the month.”

            “So, two friends.”

            “I got lots’a friends,” the kid doesn’t shout it like another might’ve but his face is scrunched in annoyance anyway. “They juss ain’t as fun as Keith’n Dave is all.”

            Nick hums, committing to neither disbelief nor affirmation.

            “How come you ain’t here with any’a yer friends? People usually travel with family or friends.”

            “My friends sent me,” Nick says. He’s eyeing what looks to be a family restaurant because it’s been a while since his breakfast (if he woke in time for them) were anything but a bowl of cereal or some stupid  power bar.

            “How come they didn’t come witchya?”

            “Because they’re my bosses.” The door opens soundlessly and it’s comfortingly cool inside. Ellis slips in before the door can shut in his face as the twenty-four year old had intended.

            He follows a woman when she leads him to a table; she’s skinny and unremarkable so Nick thanks her without compliment. Ellis is staring at him, anyway, so he focuses on the menu he lifts to block out the gaze. When he lowers it back down his fellow table-occupier, who has apparently been waiting very patiently, asks what he’s getting.

            He picks the meal that gives him, eggs, bacon, and toast and returns the question.

            “I’m savin’ my money fer lunch ‘cause I’m savin’ the rest up fer a playstation. All my friends have one an’ they say the games are awesome. My ma had’ta work an’ said I could get somethin’ fer lunch ‘cause we ain’t gonna be able’ta go out fer dinner tomorrow night—that’s what we usually do once’a month but she’s gotta work late. I figure if I get somethin’ cheap fer lunch I’kin give the rest back an’ maybe she’ll let me have it anyway.”

            Silence. For a moment.

            “Oh, but yeah, you should get the pancake stack; those are so good.”

            Nick stares at the face across from him, which smiles right back, unnerved, until the waitress comes. It’s a different girl from before, curvaceous and endowed. The gambler’s eyes draw from the tuck of her waist to the swooping lines of her hips.

            “Coffee?” Her cheeks are pink and it’s fine that she’s caught his gaze.

            He smiles for her, turns over the mug, and orders his meal and the biggest stack of pancakes they have. Ellis tries to catch the waitress before she leaves but Nick waves her on and amazingly, the kid is silent throughout the entire meal.

            Right up until they walk out the door, like the fresh air reminds him to breathe which reminds him that’s what allows him to talk.

            “Y’didn’t hafta do that,” the boy says.

            Nick ‘whatevers’ him and stops by the curb. He isn’t sure what to do during the day and he’s waiting for a suggestion. When one doesn’t come he looks down at the little hillbilly who seems to be waiting as well. The smile’s back, too.

            “We’kin go’ta my house,” Ellis offers.

            “Do you always invite strangers to your house?”

            The young face scrunches again. “Y’ain’ta stranger, Nick.”

 

            So this is how his time in Savannah is spent: he stays out until one, still banks more money than expected, and is woken (more mercifully) by quarter to ten by the imp. He’s lea throughout the city and half the things he sees don’t even register. Well, except that, really, it is a beautiful city.

            For being in the south.

            He tells Ellis as much the night before the parts are destined to arrive, and the kid grins as if the city had been his own creation.

            When the grin fades and his skinny legs are swinging and his heels are tapping the stone wall he’s sitting upon, he pokes Nick’s shoulder. “Wanna play’a game?”

            “No.”

            “Okay… kin’I ask’a question?”

            “No.”

            “How come yer boss sent ya here?”

            “He likes to broaden my horizons.”

            “Is he really yer friend?”

            “Sure.”

            “Yer best friend?”

            Okay, that’s just stupid, childish idealism and he’s not sure what to say because he doesn’t remember how old he was when he stopped ranking his friends. He’s not sure how to describe Franco, either, because he knew the older man liked having him around, sure, but there was going to be a day where Nick was going to give fucked over. Franco did it to anyone he considered an easy out or a nuisance. Nick isn’t the latter just yet but if Franco had the choice to get the flak off his own back and redirect it to his ‘protégé’, well, two stones: no problems and no future competition.

            Which is exactly why Nick plans on breaking away sooner rather than later.

            “No.”

            “Oh.”

            “You’ll grow out of best friends,” Nick informs him.

            “No way. Keith’n me are blood brothers. We’re thinkin’ ‘bout lettin’ ave become one, too.”

            “That’s a good way to get a disease.”

            Ellis’ face wrinkles before he seems to decide Nick’s joking. “Where do ya live?”

            “I guess Vegas right now.”

            “Wow! Really? Thass so cool!”

            Cigarette number three is up.

            “Thass real far away. Why’d yer boss sendjya here?”

            “…I’ve been traveling for a while. Another friend told me Savannah was nice and I wouldn’t be bothered. Guess he was wrong.”

            “Why?” The kid asks this, pure surprise and then anger stretching under his eyes. “What’s botherin’ ya?”

            Nick levels him with a stare that takes a good minute to get through the thickness of his skull.

            “Oh,” he finally whispers.

            “Oh.” Nick doesn’t care that number three isn’t done yet; he starts walking and hopes the trailing smoke and words deters the brat. He also doesn’t think about the sudden flip in his mood.

            “I juss wanted’ta show y’around,” Ellis murmurs.

            The conman keeps walking.

            “If y’didn’t want me’ta y’shoulda said somethin’.”

            “I didn’t say anything?”

            “No, y’didn’t!”

            “No? Telling you to go hang with your friends wasn’t clear? How about telling you off when I was in the shop? I think that was the first time but you probably just didn’t understand.”

            “I ain’t stupid!”

            “No? Y’ain’t? Well, I reckon I been right wrong, then.” He cringes at his own mangling of the accent.

            Ellis doesn’t cringe; he winds his leg back and shoots it forward and its booted toe collides with Nick’s shin.

            He curls over so he can hold it and ease the pain because—well—fucking shit that’s his SHIN. Who even kicks there?

            Nick cradles it and watches the little fucker run off simultaneously. He isn’t sure what he’s going to put him through just yet—maybe cutting those lips in half with his fist all over again, or a nice dent in his back where nobody would see, yeah, that’d be better.

            The rhythmic thrumming of pain dulls quickly but the deafening din of his rage isn’t placated. He’s able to walk at least and he trails the route he’d watched those boots take. He’s at a loss when he turns onto another, wider street with too many people to spot that dumb blue hat.

            He stands there, stupidly, until it dons on him to just go back to that damn shop. He turns to do just that, though, and ends up spotting Ellis.

             He’s sitting between two buildings, back against one so hard the rough edges of the brick are clinging to his shirt. He’s looking right back, albeit guiltily, but he doesn’t move when Nick approaches, as if he’d been hoping he’d been caught.

            Needless to say, Nick’s still pissed, but he doesn’t much feel like doing anything about it anymore.

            “Sorry,” Ellis says.

            “Yeah? You kicked me with your goddamn combat boot! Is that how you got that split lip the first time I saw you?”

            “No! I ain’t ever hit somebody who never hit me before. Joey hit me first when I wasn’t even lookin’!”

            Okay, a week later and that question was answered.

            “He juss thinks he’kin pick on us ‘cause we’re only in middle school an’ he’sa freshman,” Ellis continues. “An’ I bet he only does that ‘cause nobody likes him in high school. He’s’a asshole.”

            Nick thinks about nitpicking the language but that’d make him a hypocrite and he sure as hell isn’t the brat’s mother. Also, it’s funny.

            Not too funny, though. “You kicked me in the shin.”

            “I said sorry… I never wanted’ta hit anybody before. I was kinda mad.”

            “Kinda? You _kicked_ me.”

            That face wrinkles with emotion. “I’m really sorry. I wish I hadn’t.”

            “Yeah,” Nick says.

            “…Ta be fair, y’were bein’a dick.” He sucks in a breath and tries to correct himself immediately. “But we’re friends an’ ya don’t hit friends.”

            “Yeah, you do,” the gambler says. He stays standing because he’s not sitting on that filthy ground in his suit, but he does look down to meet the blue eyes. “Your friends are the people who piss you off the most because you actually give two shits about them. Doesn’t mean they’re exempt from getting the shit knocked out of them every once and a while.”

            “It was’a cheap shot, though.”

            “Yeah, it was, you little shit.” He doesn’t admit his comments had been, too. Again, he remembers being that age, he remembers feeling like shit when his dad had told him his little league games weren’t important and that those skills wouldn’t get him anywhere.

            Well, he was sure his dad would eat his words if he’d looked up the no-paying Tony Carleo two months ago and had gotten him to lift the back of his shirt to show off those nice bat-sized bruises.

            “Sorry,” Ellis reiterates.

            “It’s fine; it doesn’t even hurt anymore.” Which is a fucking lie; he’s going to be black and blue there for a week at least. “Didn’t you play soccer or something?”

            “No. Football an’ baseball.”

            “Well, that explains why it was weak as shit.”

            The boy hiccups a laugh. “…D’you get in fights a lot, Nick?”

            “Enough, I guess.”

            “…Whatta I do about Joey? My mom says’ta juss avoid him but that don’t work.”

            “I’m not your father,” Nick snaps before he even registers the words in his head. He doesn’t let Ellis’ face fall. “What does your grandfather say?”

            “He tells me’ta stand an’ face’im.”

            “Well, that’s fucking stupid.”

            The boy’s eyes widen and his eyebrows shoot up and down and tremble between directions as if he can’t force himself to decide between being angry at the insult or shocked.

            “This kid’s older and bigger, right? Come here.” He takes Ellis’ chin in his hand and turns his face to see the split between his full bottom lip.

            It’s a good one, right down the center. It’s almost Christmas red, and that’s weird, seeing as he’d had it when they’d first met. Unless it was new.

            And of course it was fucking new; the old one had been on the left side of that pink pad. Ellis’ fingertips graze the back of his hand reminding him he was supposed to be saying something.

            “Standing up to him’s not gonna do shit,” Nick tells him, removing his hand from the contact. “You want him to leave you alone, do what you did to me. Kick him in the balls or something and keep doing it.”

            “That’s kinda low,” Ellis says and he actually sounds offended that it’s even been offered.

            “Then stay the fuck away from him. Jesus, don’t ask if you’re not going to listen.”

            The kid follows him up and out of the alley. They continue like that in silence until they reach his grandfather’s shop. It’s still open which means the old guy is still inside which means the kid can get a ride home from him.

            Nick makes no move to go but he finds his cuff in between Ellis’ fingers anyway. The digits aren’t slathered with something sticky this time so he doesn’t yank away. there’s always the off-chance it’ll rip his fabric after all.

            “My grandpa’s probably got her fixed.”

            “Good news.”

            “…Kin I have’a ride in the mornin’ before ya go?”

            Inside Ellis’ grandfather walks into the front. He looks up and notices them, raises his hand in greeting, and that’s enough to cause the one gripping Nick’s suit to drop. It moves forward and opens the door.

            “Sure,” Nick says before the door can close them apart. He doesn’t mean it and he’s sure by now Ellis knows it, but he gets that same smile anyway.

 

            He’s up by seven and that’s only because he wants to get the car back early so he can stop Sal’s bitching which started again last night. George doesn’t seem to mind because the door’s open when Nick shows up and the keys are slid promptly over the counter.

            Nick slides the money right back. The old man is surprised it’s all in cash but he takes it without question.

            “It’s out back.”

            “Thanks,” the gambler says on his way out. He doesn’t say anything about how it was nice to meet him or it was nice how promptly he worked because he’d been stuck in the city for much longer than he’d intended. Besides the fact that he isn’t too sure he’ll remember the mechanic in a couple days.

            The Thunderbird’s parked in the back, pristine and beautiful as it was when he’d driven it in. He slides into the front seat, starts it up, and pulls out onto the street. It’s not until he’s stopped at a red light on his way to get his stuff from the hotel that he realizes the doors were open.

            Ellis chooses that moment to sit up from the back seat.

            Nick’s not surprised, angry, or even amused. “So what time did you wake up today: five?”

            “Six.” He carefully works his way into the front seat. He’s not wearing his boots so the conman forgives his feet on the upholstery. As long as they don’t touch him.

            The kid buckles himself in and smiles at him.

            He leaves him in the car while he gets his bags from the hotel and pays for his time. He grabs the breakfast bags they put out for customers on his way out the door, shuffling them and his bag as he goes to the car.

            Ellis takes the bags of food from him, allowing Nick to put his bags in the back and retrieve the redneck’s boots which are placed safely on the floor by those socked feet.

            By the time Nick gets back in, starts up the car, and pulls out the kid is already eating the contents of one of the bags which seems to include a piece of fruit and a muffin. Of course he’s chosen to start with the miniature cake.

            It’s silent save for the soft noises of chewing until Ellis points his finger to the left. “Go down there, it’s real nice drivin’ down there.”

            So Nick does. And he turns again when he’s requested, and again, and again until he doesn’t know where he is. Ellis does, and he’s not being so annoying, so he decides to listen to the directions for the time being.

            The time being turns into an hour and by the end of it the conman recognizes where he is, which is good considering the hick has fallen asleep. Nick only looks over because the empty lunch bag is rustling on his lap from the open window.

            He doesn’t wake when they get into a gas station and Nick fills up, he doesn’t wake when Nick has to slam on the breaks because pedestrians are idiots, and he doesn’t wake when Nick parks in his grandfather’s lot.

            George and his few assistants are working in the garage. Only the old man looks over, briefly, before resuming his work. The northerner considers lugging the dead weight out of the car and handing him over, wondering if the kid would even wake up and notice.

            He decides against it, though, because he’d be pretty pissed if someone did that to him. Ellis wouldn’t be pissed but something tells Nick it would probably sting him more than that punch to the lip ever did.

            He shakes him for a good five seconds straight before those blue eyes open, bewildered until they land on Nick. The smile follows and then shrinks and disappears. He’s realized where he is.

            They get out of the car without a word, almost in synch save for when the kid reaches back in to get his boots. Nick doesn’t close the door behind him, another difference, nor does he circle around the car to meet the southerner. The boy walks to him and goes to lean against the car but stops himself.

            The moment is awkward so Nick turns to get in the car again. “Alright, I’m going.” He shuts the door but doesn’t roll up the window or pull away. Ellis peers through the opening.

            “Go get some sleep,” Nick says, trying to get those eyes off him.

            “Okay.” The response is quiet and probably not because of fatigue. “Go give the car back.”

            “Okay.” The conman gives him a slight smile.

            “…Do y’think yer bosses will sendjya back?”

            Not for a good, long time if at all. Sal will complain and Franco will prefer to have his skills close in Vegas. He might get lucky and be able to swing a trip to New York or Chicago but he’s not so sure about the south anymore. Other people will probably get sent instead. But, because he wants to, he says: “Maybe, we’ll see in a couple of weeks.”

            Ellis smiles when the older man does even though he’s probably realized how unlikely it is. But he steps back anyway and doesn’t say anything more.

            Nick, with nothing else to say either, pulls out and drives away.

            When he hits the highway his cell rings. It’s Sal. He ignores four calls from him before considering putting the damn thing on silent.

            In the end he doesn’t just in case it rings and sports an area code from Savannah.


End file.
